Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Nonplayer #2 has passed another milestone -- both linework and first-pass color are now in place, and I'm doing the polish pass now (adding shadows, gradients, highlights, and other atmospheric stuff). It's far enough along that I've been able to show it to a few compatriots, and the response so far has been a unanimous "it's better than the first one." Assuming they're not just telling me what I want to hear (and there are quite a few really mean people in the bunch, so I think I'm getting good data), all this toil may not have been in vain after all.

Building cathedrals over a span of centuries is all well and good, and I look forward to jumping right into bricklaying for #3. That said, I have been nurturing a second story in my spare (ha!) time, and it looks like all the pieces are in place to launch a new web comic around the end of the year. This one is going to be a lot faster than Nonplayer, chiefly because I'm not drawing it! I've found someone much better than myself to handle the art duties so that I can focus on improving my writing (with a tiny bit of concepting on the side). And this artist -- I can't wait for you to see his stuff. He's amazing.

I can't get into too much detail about the project because I'd like it to be a surprise, but I am at least as excited about it as I am about Nonplayer. It's got alien monsters in it. And muffins, lots of muffins.

Why a web comic? Partly out of curiosity. It's the 21st century and all, and I wonder whether this new story may appeal to readers who might not normally cross paths with a print comic. There are a lot of eyeballs on the internet, and I'd like to see if I'm able to grab a few of them. I like the idea of gathering the content at the end of each year and funding the printed collections through Kickstarter. I like that it feels like we're setting sail in our own little pirate ship, and there's nothing but uncharted water ahead.

More than anything, it feels great to have a second iron in the fire. I know that web comics are rarely a path to riches, but a second book means twice as many chances for me to finagle my way into a career as a full-time comic creator. I have a fantasy that this new comic will help me find more hours to work on Nonplayer, so that the bricklaying can happen at some other time than 3am (yes, I've moved my daily drawing time forward to 3am, which means that I now see dead people).

2014 is shaping up to be a lovely year -- full of robots, swords, monsters and muffins. Life is good.